


Roadside Assistance

by Draco_sollicitus



Series: Short but Sometimes Sweet: Damerey Collection [5]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens, Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Babies love Rey, Deserts, Diners, F/M, Flirting, Fluff, Mechanic Rey, Modern AU, Pilot Poe Dameron, Poe Not So Much, Poe loves Rey, Rey is Competent, Rey loves babies, Single Dad Poe, Single Parent AU, meet cute
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-25
Updated: 2018-04-27
Packaged: 2019-04-27 14:09:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,868
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14427057
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Draco_sollicitus/pseuds/Draco_sollicitus
Summary: Poe Dameron doesn't know what he did to deserve this: he's stranded on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere, his phone is dead, and he already blew through nap time.Okay, so the nap time is for his son, a typically good-natured toddler who's beginning to scowl at the lack of sleep, Poe's definitely the one who forgot to pack a charger in the diaper bag this morning, and he did choose to live in the middle of nowhere when NASA offered him a job as a research pilot.Still. He doesn't know what he's going to do next, something that's more common than not these days as he struggles with the very new reality of being a single parent. When a pick-up truck pulls over, he's more than relieved at the idea of some help.And then the prettiest woman he's ever seen gets out of the truck with a toolbox and proceeds to tease him mercilessly about his lack of car knowledge, while effortlessly charming his traitor of a son.Yeah. Poe doesn't know what he did to deserve this.





	1. Roadside

**Author's Note:**

> Dedicated to [Shuns](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shuns/pseuds/shuns) who wanted to see Damerey interact with kids, and [RaissaPL](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RaissaPL/pseuds/RaissaPL) who requested a Single!Dad!Poe AU 
> 
> :)

“Phone, keys, wallet,” Poe Dameron mutters to himself on a typical Thursday morning. “Phone, keys, wallet.” He repeats the mantra as he pats his various pockets, checking that each of the three essential Poe-items are present. It’s something he’s taken to doing before he goes anywhere because he’s so exhausted these days, he’d forget his head if it weren’t, you know, attached to that … spine thing…coming out of his shoulders.

“Neck.” Poe says, looking in the mirror. The circles under his eyes have their own circles. “It’s called a neck, you idiot.”

Next, Poe throws every Bee-item into the diaper bag.

Fresh diapers: Check.

Applesauce in case Bee gets snacky: Check.

Goldfish for when Bee inevitably ignores the healthier snack Poe wants him to eat: Check.

Extra change of clothes (God, he’d learned to pack that the hard way): Check.

Baby wipes, three containers of: Check.

Soft toys and other Bee-approved distractions: Check.

Travel changing pad (he’s never sure there’ll be a family restroom for him to use): Checkity Check

Poe zips up the bag and pulls it onto his shoulder, and he gives up completely on the disaster that is his hair. Kes is coming back from vacation later this week, and he’d already promised to let Poe sleep for 36 hours straight. Poe can comb his hair then. And shower. And eat sitting down. God, he’s a wreck.

He heads to the door, muttering “Phone, keys, wallet, bag, phone, keys, wallet, bag….I’m forgetting something, what am I forgetting?”

There’s a babble behind him at the same time he remembers.

“The baby,” Poe groans, pivoting and running to the playpen. “Oh God, sorry buddy, sorry, sorry, Daddy didn’t forget you, he didn’t.” Bee looks absolutely unworried by any of this, but Poe’s a wreck. He starts to cry; then he laughs at himself.

And then he cries again. He’s been Bee’s only parent for two and a half months now; that’s the first time he’s called himself anything close to “dad.”

***

They’re on the 58 out near Bissel, an hour before sundown, and Bee’s looking groggy (Shit, why didn’t Poe schedule this better around naptime? But he’d had to drop off paperwork at the base and the fax machine was broken and God’s clearly punishing him despite, you know, _taking in an infant and sacrificing his sleep for the next eight thousand years,_ and Bee napped a little bit in his car seat but not nearly enough, and God, he’s so bad at this).

Then, there’s a suspicious whining noise, a worrisome clunk, and a distinct lack of any engine sounds whatsoever. The car’s dead. It coasts to a stop while Poe guides it to the side of the road, entirely off the asphalt. He turns the key over, hopefully, but: Nothing.

Great. Just. Great.

Luckily, it’s not that hot out, about 65 degrees. However, he does worry about what will happen when the sun goes down. There doesn’t seem to be much traffic out here, about fifteen miles from Edwards Air Force Base, and Poe bangs his head on the steering wheel before going to call emergency services.

His phone’s dead.

Okay, that’s fine, just get the charger out of the diaper bag.

Poe unzips the diaper bag, and maintains a cheerful conversation with his son. “How you doin’ back there, buddy?” He calls.

“Dada,” Bee proclaims, and even through his mini panic, Poe smiles at his clever kid.

“Yeah, that’s right, Dada,” he grins while digging around the diaper bag. Well, that’s great. “Dada forgot the charger.” Poe wants to kick himself, but he wonders if that would set a bad example for the baby.

“Out,” Bee demands, finger jabbing towards the window. “Out!”

It won’t hurt if they go outside: Poe’s got sunscreen and a hat in the car, so he gets out of his side after checking the side mirror (no cars coming, which is great, just great, they’re going to die out here _no you aren’t, get it together, Dameron_ ). He walks around to the back and gets his son ready to go outside.

“Ball!” Bee declares imperiously, pointing at his shoes while Poe tugs a floppy hat onto his adorable head. He isn’t sure where his kid got those ginger curls from – Tallie was blonde, for Christ’s sake – but he does know it probably means he hasn’t inherited Poe’s tan complexion and resistance to the sun.

“Nah, those are shoes. You have no idea what you’re doing, huh, buddy?” Poe laughs at Bee, who’s yanking on his shoes ineffectually. “Me either, bud. Me either.” Bee makes a cooing noise of support (Poe thinks) and then successfully removes a single baby-sized sneaker and lodges it at Poe’s head.

“Guess you have a future career in the major leagues,” Poe grumbles, rubbing what might just be a bump tomorrow. Bee gurgles a laugh, and Poe can’t keep the scowl on his face for long.

What can he say. The kid’s cute.

***

He’s pacing back and forth on the passenger side of the car for about ten minutes before salvation appears.

Specifically, a well-kept vintage truck – painted red and everything – trundles into view and comes to a halt fifteen feet in front of Poe’s car. The driver’s wearing a ball cap, so Poe couldn’t get a good look at his face, but he was small, he knows that much. Poe wraps his arms around his son, and wonders at where this weird fear and paranoia and suspicion came from.

Right. Parenting.

Poe walks around to the front of his car and fixes what he hopes is a friendly smile on his face. He presses a kiss into Bee’s forehead. “We got this buddy,” he whispers to his son. Bee babbles worriedly, clearly picking up on his dad’s mood, and Poe kisses him again. “Happy laughs, buddy. Happy laughs.” He pulls a face, and it gets his son to giggle, at least.

The door pops open, and the driver leaps out, beat-up Converse slapping into the California dust with a distinctive thwack. Poe’s eyes catch the shoes, first – he’d had a pair just like them in high school – and his eyes travel up to see the face of their savior (who he is diligently not thinking of as a potential serial killer).

Long legs encased in overalls, slender torso, lean arms, perky t–

Oh. Oh God.

The prettiest girl he’s ever seen is resting her arm on the inside of her door, leaning her weight against it, and she’s _grinning_ at him.

“You boys lost?” She drawls, cheerfully.

“Our car broke down, ma’am,” Poe clarifies, and then winces. This girl can’t be over 25, so she’s at least eight years younger than he is, and he probably shouldn’t be calling her ‘ma’am’.

She seems to have the same thought, and a scowl briefly descends on her sharp yet elegant features, before her nose twitches and the smile is back.

Oh fuck. He’s fucked.

“Rey will do just fine, Mr. …?” She yanks a toolbox off her seat at the same time she asks for his name.

“Dameron,” He remembers his name, thank God. “Poe Dameron.”

“Alright, Mr. Poe Dameron, what happened here?”

Poe hesitantly explains what happened, but realizes he can’t actually pinpoint the actual issue.

“It made like a …. _Reeeeeeeee_? Noise? And then a _ka-thunk-ka-thunk-ka-thunk._ And then it died, like _whum._ ” Poe peers at Rey earnestly over his son’s head and sees that she’s trying not to laugh. “Do you know what’s wrong with it?”

“Not yet, no,” Rey laughs, and then walks over to his driver side door, wrenches it open, and unlatches the front hood. “But I have a feeling something’s wrong with you. Sun get to your head?”

 _No, just pretty girls,_ Poe from a year ago would have said. _But I wouldn’t say no to an exam._ Poe from a year ago wasn’t a father and didn’t have a squirming toddler on his hip, and could have charmed the pants – overalls? – off of anyone.

Rey doesn’t seem to notice his lack of response, suddenly very interested in the inside of his car.

“Are you a mechanic?” Poe asks, as she opens her giant toolbox. Rey shoots him a look of disbelief, and if Poe weren’t holding a baby, he’d smack his forehead. “Sorry, sorry, that’s just like… the Mary Poppins bag of tools.”

“I like that,” Rey laughs, sweetly. “That’s good.” Poe flushes, and he prays that when she stands up and looks at him in the face, strangely, she thinks the color in his face is from sunburn.

It’s not hot out, though, and he’s wearing sunscreen, and he’s very obviously blushing because a pretty girl laughed at something he said. “And yes,” she adds, hefting a tool that he doesn’t have a name for in her hand. “I’m a mechanic. Studied to be a physicist, but refused to go get my Master’s. I got so bored of sitting still, ya know?”

“I know,” Poe mutters. Then, he sighs. He’s been working on being more grateful, since the accident, more happy with what he has, more happy that Bee is safe and with him. It’s difficult, but he’s getting better at it.

“Is this the part where you tell me what you do for a living?”

“Who, me?” Poe asks, the lilt of her voice enough to knock him off his axis with her back turned to him and her attention fully on his – carburetor? He thinks that’s a car word.

“No, the baby.” Rey cusses under her breath, leans over to the toolbox, shifts around, and comes back with another item. “What do you do for a living, Poe?”

“I’m a … I fly things,” Poe says. He forgot the word for ‘neck’ this morning, it’s only natural he’d forget the name of his job, but he has a feeling this has less to do with sleep deprivation and more to do with how the girl of his dreams – tall, long legs, freckles, nice laugh, great smile, funny, smart, can clearly kick his ass – has somehow appeared out of the literal desert like a goddamn mirage to save his life. Rey smiles at him patiently over her shoulder and then returns to tinkering with something. “Sorry, I’m … a little off right now.”

“Understandable,” Rey sings from inside the hood. “What kind of things do you fly?”

“I work for NASA!” Poe remembers and tells her this triumphantly. _Yeah. NASA’s cool. Girls love NASA._ Somewhere, he can feel Tallie and Jess laughing at him. The jerks. “I’m a research pilot over at Edwards.”

Rey stands up fully at that and wipes her hands on a dirtied rag, her eyes lit up with some internal spark. _Did that work? Did that impress her?_

“Can I get something straight?” She asks, grin spreading across her lovely face. Poe nods, eagerly, and she grins wider. “So: a pilot for _NASA_ doesn’t know how to fix his car?” Rey looks delighted, and sure enough, she throws her hair back – caught up as it is in three interesting buns – and howls with laughter.

“I was a _math_ major, not an engineer!” Poe protests, but Rey keeps cackling even as she jumps back into the engine.

“So, Poe-who-can’t-fix-cars, what’s your son’s name?” Rey asks a minute later, as Poe bounces him up and down on his hip, trying to distract him.

“Bee,” Poe answers, automatically, not even addressing her insulting nickname.

“Bee?” Rey smiles at both of them over her shoulder. “A budding apiarist?”

“Nah.” Poe grins back at her, because he’s a total goner. “No, his name is Bartholomew Byron Lintra. We call him Beebee for short, or Bee.” _Called,_ a nasty, angry voice in Poe’s head corrects him. _And there is no we, not anymore._

“That’s quite a name for such a little fellow,” Rey says, clanging around with something under the hood. She emerges and wipes her brow, leaving behind a streak of grease. She’s somehow prettier with it, which does not help Poe’s togetherness-levels. He’s tired, he’s stressed, he’s holding a baby. He misses his friends.

“Yeah, his mom was a big poetry fan,” Poe shrugs and smiles fondly down at Bee. “And his other mom couldn’t bear to call him Byron, so she agreed to it if Bartholomew came first.”

“I’m sorry, but –” Rey’s brow is furrowed

“Yeah, I’m his biological father,” Poe smiles at her, easily, because this part’s never bothered him to talk about. “I was a sperm donor for my two friends, Jess and Tallie.”

“Gotcha.” Rey nods, once and then returns to work after grabbing a tool Poe is fairly certain is called a Big Fancy Wrench-Looking Thing.

“I’m his father-father too,” Poe mutters, a half second later.

“Sorry?” Rey pops her head back out, and smiles at him quizzically.

“I said, I’m his father-…father…too…” Poe would cover his face with his hands if he weren’t holding a squirming toddler. Rey still looks politely confused, so he tries to explain. “I uh…raise him?”

“That’s lovely,” Rey beams at him. “What a lovely father and son.” It’s the nicest thing she’s said to _Poe_ so far _,_ and he has a hunch it’s because Bee was a little mixed up in the compliment too (she seems to have no problem praising Bee). Poe grins at his son.

“That’s my little wingman,” Poe whispers to Bee. He bounces him on his hip, Bee’s perpetually sticky, tiny hand in his own while he dances them around in a tiny circle. “That’s – my – wing – man.” Bee coos cheerfully and then tries to grab at Poe’s mouth. Poe laughs around his kid’s fingers and pretends to nibble them.

“I wish I had a camera.” Rey’s done in the hood of the car, and she’s slipping the Fancy Wrench back into her toolbox. She pulls a bandana out of her overalls and wipes her brow, smiling a fragile, gentle smile that Poe has a feeling she doesn’t get to use often.

Poe considers this, looking at Bee. “I actually only have one picture with him,” he admits, quietly. “From the hospital.”

Rey cocks her head at that statement, and Poe shakes his head. He’s not ready to talk about why that is. She smiles and walks around to the driver’s seat. “Keys?” She asks, holding her hand out. Poe throws her the keys without thinking – and then he remembers to worry. What if she’s a thief? No, Rey the mechanic is not a thief, he knows that – and Rey gets in and turns the engine over.

“Much better,” she declares, joyfully, as the beast roars back to life. She lets the car idle and gets back out. “Can I do anything else for you gentlemen?” Rey smiles at him, her tan face soft and open, and Poe wants to say, _stay forever,_ he wants to say, _don’t leave yet,_ and then he figures he can say:

“Let me buy you dinner?” He has to imagine the look of absolute pride on Bee’s face. “There’s a diner ten miles east, if you don’t mind eating with a cranky, tired, whiny baby. And Bee will be there, too.” _Oh my God, Dameron, that was almost smooth._

Rey laughs, and it sounds like the best damn music he ever heard, and something lightning quick but also somehow slow and sweet pools through his system. “Well, with an offer like that, how could a girl say no?” She waves off Poe’s offer of helping her carry her toolbox back to the truck, and she waits for him to pull out into the road in front of her before following him down the highway.

“Be cool, dude,” Poe mutters to his son in the rearview mirror.

 Bee gives him an utterly impressed look and says, “Buh.” Which he understands is roughly translated as, _I think you mean you need to be cool, Dad, because you’re a flaming dumpster of a human being right now, and desert goddesses don’t just settle for flaming dumpsters of human beings._

“You’re right,” Poe acknowledges. “You are very right, son.”

***

They pull into the almost empty lot of Maz’s Cantina fifteen minutes later. Dusk is settling over the desert now, pulling with it the lavender hush of approaching night, and Poe breathes in the crisp air deeply before turning to take Bee out of his seat.

Rey smiles at them both as she gets out of the truck, and he sees that she’s taken her hair out of the buns; it’s half up and has clearly been combed on the car ride over. She’s also pulled a pretty blue sweater over her shoulders. It makes Poe feel weirdly pleased, that she’d feel a desire to adjust her appearance just to eat dinner with a Human Disaster and his admittedly pretty great kid. It gives him hope, honestly, that she might view him as something more than a struggling dad with sad eyes.

They take a booth in the front window, and Poe orders a burger and fries, and a plate of meatballs for Bee. Maz winks at him – yeah, he’s a regular, and Rey laughs when Maz calls him her ‘boyfriend’ – and turns to Rey, who turns pink and shuffles the menu around awkwardly.

“Get whatever you want,” Poe murmurs. “You literally saved our lives.”

“I’ll just get the soup of the day,” Rey insists. Poe knows he isn’t imagining the sound of her stomach rumbling.

He and Maz exchange “A Look,” and Maz wanders away to get their drinks before disappearing into the back.

“So, Rey, what made you want to be a mechanic?” Poe asks, hoping to learn more about her, hoping to make sure she isn’t a mirage he dreamed up in a fit of sun sickness.

Rey smiles at him, shyly, and he feels a weird need to apologize. “Sorry, that was probably rude.”

 “No, no it wasn’t,” Rey insists, blushing. “Just. No one’s ever … asked me that before. Asked me anything about school, really.” Poe’s gut twists uncomfortably, but she’s smiling peacefully at him, so he figures it’s okay. “I had a really great advisor, Dr. Skywalker, and I loved the subject of my actual research, but staying inside almost all day and night to look at charts and reading. Ugh.” Her nose wrinkles, and it’s still adorable. “I was bored out of my mind. I quit, with vigor, dumped my crappy boyfriend, moved back out here to the desert and started up a shop. Now, I fix up old and/or nice cars for rich men who don’t know the first thing about their old and/or nice cars.”

“I can’t help but feel that was directed at me,” Poe laughs self-consciously, if only to hide how impressive he finds her because God, his mouth’s probably half-open by now.

“You think?” Rey grins at him, and it’s half-sweet, half-cocky, and it’s full-making-him-crazy, but then she turns to Bee, who’s cooing in his seat, and it switches to a mega-watt smile. God, Poe’s so wrecked. He doesn’t have a chance. “Hey, sweet Bee, no one’s talking to you, I’m so sorry. What do you got there?”

Bee’s waving his spoon around, and he smiles at Rey when she taps the utensil with her finger. “Spoo!” He proclaims.

“A scholar in the making,” she says, very seriously, still talking to Bee. Her voice is sweeter when she talks to him, but she talks to him like, well, he’s a human, and it’s such a change from everyone in Poe’s life, all the strangers who coo and poke at Beebee while he’s in his Björn, that Poe’s a little floored.

“It’s a spoon, you’re very right, Bartholomew.” Rey’s still talking at him, and then she grabs the plate of meatballs from Maz, who’s materialized out of nowhere (or, more realistically, Poe’s just entirely focused on Rey).  She starts to cut up the meal into Bee-size pieces, humming cheerfully.

“Did you have a younger sibling?” Poe asks, curiously.

“Technically,” Rey laughs, self-consciously, and then puts a few pieces of meatball on Bee’s tray. “Try to get some of those in your mouth, Beebee boy,” she instructs, smiling at him. He’s covered in sauce in seconds, and Rey laughs, delightedly. Poe’s heart is full, too full, God, where has this woman been, how has he never met her, why did he have to wait thirty-three years to meet her?

“How did you technically have a baby sibling?” Poe blurts out, because that’s a better question than any of his intense, actual questions.

“Foster kid,” Rey shrugs. “My foster father collected us for the money, and we had a couple young kids come through. They were more likely to be adopted, so they didn’t stick around for long, but if I didn’t take care of them, no one would.”

Oh. Crap. Somehow, Poe’s sitting in a diner, in the dark, with a baby that’s somehow his , and the world’s most perfect, beautiful woman is sitting in front of him. He _just_ met her, but Rey’s cracking his heart in half like it was eggshell, and Jesus, how does she look so unbothered by what she just said? Rey’s still playing with Bee, gesticulating very dramatically and demonstrating proper eating technique, completely at ease with the bomb she just dropped.

“Bee’s moms,” he blurts out, and Rey looks up and stares at him. “They uh,” this part _is_ hard to talk about. Sensing the change in his mood, her eyes grow sad. They’re so luminous he almost forgets what he wants to say. Almost.  “Tallie and Jess, they – they died a few months ago in a car crash.”

Rey doesn’t interrupt, but she nods at him to keep going, and he fidgets with his napkin awkwardly. “After he was born, they had asked if I’d want to take care of him, you know, if anything ever happened to them. And when you talk about that shit, you don’t really think about it actually happening, but.” Poe swallows, hard. “It happened. I wasn’t ready to be a father. I still don’t think I’m doing half of this right, ever.”

“Don’t say that,” Rey says, and she reaches across the ancient tabletop to catch his hands in her own. Poe feels something settle in his chest from that simple touch. It makes sense, really; Rey seems to be good at fixing things. “Don’t say that, Poe. You give a damn about Bee. You obviously love him. You’re doing enough. More than.”

There’s so much conviction in her voice, it breaks his heart at the same time it stitches some fairly important things back together.

“Thank you,” he murmurs, cheeks heated. He strokes his thumbs over her knuckles, and Rey squeezes his hands. She releases him a second later when Maz appears with two burger plates.

“Out of the soup, child,” she says, unapologetically. “Don’t worry though, we’re having a two for one special, your burger’s free.”

“How fortuitous,” Poe says solemnly. Rey throws them both a dirty look but then her stomach rumbles again, and she looks at her plate, eyes as wide as flying saucers.

“Foo,” Bee comments, judiciously, and Rey nods.

“Yep, food,” she says, picking up her burger and staring at it covetously. “Food, Bee.”

Rey eats like it might be the last time she’ll ever see food, and it makes Poe like her even more.

***

Poe closes up the tab with Maz, fussing at her up at the register while he tries to get her to charge him for the burger.

“You’ve never done a two for one special,” he argues.

“And I haven’t seen you smile in months, my boy,” Maz snaps right back, shoving her glasses up the bridge of her nose. Poe rolls his eyes, lets her ring it up as is, but then tips her twice the amount of the burger.

“Asshole,” Maz tells him grandly, and Poe nods and shrugs in agreement. He turns to head back to the table, but Maz catches his sleeve. “And Poe?”

“Yes, Maz?”

“I hope that all  _three_ of you come back here soon, hmm?” She gives him a devilish wink and adjusts her apron.

Poe looks over at their booth:

Rey’s got Bee on her lap, and he’s out cold, a small, chubby hand fisted in the collar of her t-shirt. Rey’s resting her chin on his son’s head, her own eyes sleepy and peaceful from the heavy meal; while he watches, she shifts slightly, her arms tightening around Bee, and her head turning so her cheek is on top of his red curls.

“Me too, Maz,” Poe says, a deep and irreversible fondness growing in his chest, too great and terrible and powerful and perfect for him to even bother to control. “Me too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> God, the sequel will probably just write itself
> 
>  
> 
> So many AUs, so little time, let me know if there's another you want to see.  
> I have planned:  
> Library AU  
> Dancing AU  
> Chef AU  
> Pregnancy AU (Poe is /not/ the father, eep)  
> Matchmaker AU  
> Continuance of that ER nurse AU  
> Continuance of that sad flower AU
> 
> Aaaaand a Finn POV in the regular universe


	2. Date Night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Poe tries to go on a date with Rey Smith, desert goddess and mechanic superhero.
> 
> It....doesn't go according to plan.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: some #fresh language, discussion of condoms, some mild friskiness (nothing that couldn't be found in a PG-13 movie though, so I'mma leave the rating where it is)

After they say goodbye to Maz and leave the perfect bubble of the Cantina, Rey Smith smiles at him before she walks back to her truck and drives away in the night. Her phone number is safely in Poe’s contacts, and she had told him “don’t be a stranger,” after kissing a sleepy Bee gently on the forehead and turning away.

 _Don’t go,_ Poe’s biting back the words even now. _Please don’t disappear, please don’t let me wake up tomorrow and find out this was all just the best dream I’ve ever had._

“See you around, kid,” is what he shouts at her when her truck roars to life, and she’s rolled her window down to wave at them. Bee makes a fussy noise at Poe, and he mutters an apology.

“Let me know if and when your car breaks again, flyboy,” she yells back, flipping him off good-naturedly. He watches her tail-lights disappear down the 58 before walking to his own car, Bee now fast asleep in his arms.

Bee stirs gently before he settles him into his seat. It’s not even that late, only about 8:00, but he feels guilty for keeping him out of bed. “Shhh,” he murmurs to Bee while buckling him in. “Guess what, buddy?” He whispers, his son still completely unconscious. “Daddy met the girl of his dreams today. And she might not even hate him yet. So, we got that going for us.”

His son doesn’t respond, but he hadn’t really expected him to. Poe drives home with an inescapable warm, golden bubble blossoming in his chest.

***

Poe realizes that it was not, in fact, a delightful dream the very next day.

He’s carrying Bee in the bjorn, walking around the supermarket, when he spies a familiar face.

The hero of the previous day is wearing a flowy skirt, in a pretty forest green color, and a tan crop top, which reveals a muscular stomach. Her hair is braided around her face, and she’s examining a grocery list clutched in her left hand, while she balances a small basket on her right hip.

Rey Smith is standing in the local grocery story, looking for all the world like a faery goddess, scowling at the produce as if it had done her family great wrong.

“What’s up, Sunshine?” Poe asks breezily, pushing a cart with one hand to stand across from her. “Those avocados fuck with you somehow?”

“Should you be cursing in front of your kid, fucknut?” Rey fires back, not even looking up from the produce. Poe snorts, and then she lifts her eyes and smiles at him, sweetly. “And no, I was just wondering why fresh food has to be so stupidly expensive. Forget it, I’m just going to buy canned corn again.”

Bee squirms, trying to look at the source of his father’s distraction (B.B. takes it as a personal insult when Poe stops looking at him for even a second, sometimes), and Rey beams at him, forgetting her issues with expensive groceries. “Hello, little man!” She greets Bartholomew. Rey walks around the stand and comes into Bee’s line of sight so she can wave at him. “Someone looks sleepy,” Rey comments, smiling at Poe.

“Almost nap time,” Poe explains, bashfully, as if she’d smiled at him and not his much cuter, much more likable kid.

“Ah,” Rey nods, sagely. “Naptime, the most important time. I won’t hold you two up.” She walks towards the canned food aisle, but then turns around and smiles at Poe, who’s still trying to remember how to talk. “Hey, Dameron!” She calls, ignoring the stares of people around them. “My number works, you know. You should use it.”

“Uh,” Poe says intelligently. “I was going to!” He was, he really was. He’d typed and deleted thirty messages today alone, chickening out every time.

“Mhm,” Rey smirks at him, and then turns back around.

“Hey, Smith!” Poe hollers back at her. Bee scolds him, quietly, and Poe rubs his hand over his back, soothingly. “You want me to make you dinner tonight? To thank you for yesterday?”

“Isn’t that what the diner was for?” And bless the universe and whoever’s watching over it because she’s walking back towards him. Poe steps towards her as well, completely forgetting his cart for the time being.

“Yeah, well, what can I say? I always overdo it, and I’m a pretty mean cook.”

“I don’t think you could be a mean anything,” Rey laughs, gently. “And that’s a compliment, don’t worry.”

Poe wishes he could sink into the floor from embarrassment. She thinks he’s nice? That’s good, he can be nice, he _is_ nice, sometimes, when he isn’t yelling at other pilots to get their heads out of their asses, or blowing off his bosses to do whatever he wants in the air, or –

Yeah. He can be nice. He can be nice for Rey Smith.

“Is that a yes?” Poe asks uncertainly. “You’ll let me cook for you?”

“It’s a yes,” Rey confirms. “If only because I don’t feel like cooking tonight. Text me your address and a time!”

“Uh, do you want to…shop with us?” _Yeah, c’mon floor, swallow me up any time now._ “So I can figure out what you like?”

“Sure,” Rey comes to stand right in front of him, and Poe can’t breathe, he really can’t. “But I think you’ll find I have pretty straightforward tastes. I’ll eat pretty much anything.”

They wander around for a quarter hour, Poe pointing at random items, and Rey giving her general opinion (she likes everything except for baked beans, apparently). Then, they walk into the dessert/baked goods aisle, and Rey lights up prettier than a Christmas tree.

“Can we make brownies?” She asks, wide-eyed and bouncing slightly on her heels. “I’ll buy the mix if you want, I just – “ She grabs the nearest Duncan Hines product and hugs it to her chest.

“Oh, sweetheart,” Poe sighs, dramatically, bouncing on his heels himself, if only to soothe Bee. “No, if I make brownies, I’m going to make them from scratch.”

“From—” Rey looks even more excited. “You can do that? You can bake shit? Like on _MasterChef?_ ”

“Yeah, I guess,” Poe laughs, awkwardly. “Here, let’s go buy some eggs, and grab that baker’s chocolate.” Rey obliges, cheerfully, and she almost skips over to the refridgerated section of the store.

She’s grabbing a carton of eggs – after Poe instructs her to make sure none of them are cracked, and he’s fairly horrified when she says, “Why, does that matter?” – when an older lady stops by the cart to smile at Bee.

“What a handsome boy,” she compliments Poe, and he thanks her, smiling. He’s used to random strangers talking to him about his kid, now, because yeah, he’s aware that Bartholomew Byron Lintra is probably the cutest kid who’s ever lived, and that’s not even bias talking. “You three are a darling family.” Poe doesn’t know what to say to that, but thank God someone does:

“Thank you,” Rey chirps, dropping the eggs in the cart. “That’s very kind of you to say.” Bee oooo’s in agreement. The older woman waves and walks away.

“Sorry,” Rey shrugs, grabbing the cart from the back. “Didn’t want to weird you out, but I didn’t see the point in correcting a cute little old lady, you know?” She pulls the cart behind her as she heads towards checkout, strong arm muscles standing out in relief.

Poe’s too busy hyperventilating, if only because he was so supremely _not_ weirded out by the cute little old lady’s proclamation. In fact, it felt so weirdly _right._ And now he’s imagining the three of them as a tiny family, Rey acting as a ball of sunshine, lighting up his life in a way that’s been sorely missing, and Poe making her smile the way she smiled when he suggested baking brownies from scratch, every fucking day for the rest of his life.

Somehow, his feet have moved of their own accord to follow Rey to the checkout lane, and he stares at her while she loads up the conveyor belt. He doesn’t know how someone looks so pretty under fluorescent lights in a vast and soulless supermarket, but here Rey Smith is, incandescent and utterly untouchable.

***

Dinner is a smashing success, even after Bee throws a handful of spaghetti on the floor, splattering both Poe and Rey in a truly impressive way.

“I’m sorry,” Poe had moaned, horrified. “Oh, God, I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” Rey shrugged. “Most of my clothes are covered in some kind of stain.” She wipes half-heartedly at her arms and skirt and then gives up, smiling at Bee.

“Me too, Sunshine,” Poe grinned at her even though she wasn’t looking at him. “Me too.”

Now, they’re sitting on the couch, and Rey has magically gotten Bee to fall asleep in under twenty minutes. Poe’s found some brainless sitcom on TV, and Rey walks back from the bathroom, looking much less saucy.

“How did you do that?” Poe groans, resting his head on the back of the couch.

“Baby whisperer,” Rey explains cheerfully, plopping down next to him. “Some may even say that I’m magic.”

“They may, huh?” Poe grins at her, his head lolling to the side.

Rey’s lip catches between her teeth, and God, she’s so pretty, Rey Smith is so pretty, and she looks at him she like might want him to kiss her, and yeah, he definitely wants to kiss her. Poe’s warm, and happy, and Rey Smith is so pretty.

He’s had that thought before, and now she’s leaned in a little bit, but he’s warm, so warm, and everything’s nice, and Bee’s asleep, and Rey’s here, and Poe feels 165% less stressed than normal as a result, and –

The world gets very dark.

When he jerks awake, it’s almost eleven p.m, and Kes Dameron is sitting next to him.

“Ah!” Poe shouts, startling upward and then wincing at the crick in his neck.

“That’s flattering,” Kes says cheerfully.

“Sorry Dad,” Poe groans, rubbing his neck. “I was just expecting someone else, you know?”

“You mean your pretty girlfriend who you’ve been hiding from your poor father?” Kes teases.

“Rey isn’t my girlfriend,” Poe mumbles, unhappy about that fact, and unhappy that he’d fucking fallen asleep on her.

“No, you just let any random woman hang out unsupervised in your house while your one-year-old son sleeps in the next room,” Kes says mock-seriously.

“She isn’t my girlfriend,” Poe says stubbornly.

“Well, if she isn’t your girlfriend, you’re a giant idiot,” Kes points out, and then stands up and stretches. “I’m going to go pass out in the guest room, _mijo,_ I'll see you in the morning.”

“When did you get home?” Poe asks, yawning, standing up as well.

“About a half hour ago,” Kes answers. “Talked to your not-girlfriend for a few minutes. Then, I looked over at your lame ass and decided you needed the sleep, but also that I wanted to see your face when you woke up and realized that you fell asleep on a date.”

“I did, didn’t I?” Poe groans and slaps his forehead. “Jesus Christ. Was she pissed?”

“Not in the least,” Kes assures him. “But I’d buy her flowers anyway. You know, just so you don’t mess this up.”

“I don’t want to,” Poe admits, shyly. Kes smiles at him warmly and gives him a real hug before going to bed.

Poe manages to get to his own bed before falling asleep again. All his dreams are of Rey, surrounded by green and growing things, flowers in her hair, stars in her eyes.

***

[Poe, 6:45 p.m.]: What are you doing tomorrow?

[Mechanic-Rey, 6:47 p.m.]: Ransacking the dump, hbu?

[Poe, 6:48 p.m.]: Same, actually :P

[Poe, 6:48 p.m.]: No, really I have a few meetings in the morning, but I was thinking closer to dinnertime, around 18:00?

[Mechanic-Rey, 6:52 p.m.]: Oh, yeah, I don’t usually do anything after 5. I might be messing around with whatever I scavenged, but that’s it.

[Poe, 6:53 p.m.]: Cool! Any chance you’d be down for hanging out with BB again?

 He sets his phone down and groans, loudly, into his hands. “Hang out with … get your shit _together,_ Dameron. We used to have game! We used to talk to girls all the time!”

Bee coos loudly from his spot on the floor. “Baaaa!”

“Thanks, buddy, maybe I do still got it.” Poe chews on his thumbnail anxiously and picks up his phone when the screen lights up.

[Mechanic-Rey, 6:54 p.m.]: You can safely assume that I’m always down to hang out with my favorite man.

“Well, at least we know she likes you,” Poe comments drily to his charming son. Bee gives him a gummy smile, and Poe can’t help but smile back. Then, there’s another message.

[Mechanic-Rey, 6:54 p.m.]: **Men. My favorite men.

“Oh, fuckity fuck, Dad’s back in the game!” Poe howls in victory and leaps up from the couch. He scoops Bee up and kisses him about forty times, which makes Bee squeal, and his son even tries to smack his lips against Poe’s cheeks, but fusses when he meets with scruff. “You’re right, I should shave.” Poe nods, vigorously. “What if I stay awake long enough to kiss her this time? I should shave…and shower….and text your abuelo so I can do all that.” Bee claps his hand against Poe’s cheek in agreement, and Poe pops his lips at his son while trying to think of something cool to say to Rey.

He’s distracted by his kid, who, once he’s no longer being held by Dad, remembers that it’s close to bedtime, and starts to get fussy.

Still, Poe manages to send a semi-coherent message.

[Poe, 6:58 p.m.]: Do you want to come here, then?

[Mechanic-Rey, 6:58 p.m.]: Sounds great!

[Poe, 6:58 p.m.]: Bee’s really excited.

Bee _is_ excited, but if only because he’s almost successful in putting his toes in his mouth. Poe rolls his eyes and tries to entertain Bee with one hand while texting with the other.

[Mechanic-Rey, 6:58 p.m.]: So should I plan to be there around 6?

[Poe, 6:59 p.m.]: 6 would be perfect.

[Poe, 6:59 p.m.]: (It’s a date!)

He doesn’t wait for the next text because it really is time to get Bee ready for bed. Once he’s managed to convince his kid that sleeping is a really, really great idea, and he’s read every book that starts with the letter “e” and sang every song he can remember that doesn’t heavily feature curse words, it’s almost 8:00.

Poe sags to the couch and grabs his abandoned phone. He shrugs; he doesn’t expect Rey to respond to all of his texts, and that’s the last coherent thought he has before he passes out on the sofa cushions.

He wakes up, groggy, to Bee shouting something at him that he needs to translate, and fast, around 5:00 a.m. Poe manages to find out the problem (accident), fix the problem (new diaper and jammies), and get his son back to sleep around 5:45 a.m. He might as well stay awake, now, so he goes to fix a pot of coffee.

There _is_ a text waiting for him when he checks his phone. Its brevity feels a little strange.

[Mechanic-Rey, 1:25 a.m.] Haha, awesome.

Does she…not want it to be a date? Has she (reasonably, intelligently) pieced together that he’s a human dumpster fire? Poe decides to drink an entire pot of coffee before he tries to contemplate what Rey meant by “haha, awesome.”

After the second liter of coffee, still hot enough to burn his tongue when he drinks it out straight out of the pot, he gets dressed, quickly, and then it’s almost time for Bee to wake up, and look at that, Bee’s awake, and Bee’s hungry, so he feeds Bee and then dresses Bee (because, yeah, it’s easier for his kid to eat before dressing because Poe isn’t wasting a cute outfit ever again before the day’s even started), and then Kes shows up to relieve him so Poe can go to those stupid meetings, and he comes sprinting back into the house when he realizes he forgot his car keys –

And, yeah, it’s good that Poe’s so busy and scrambled, so he doesn’t have to constantly reflect on what those four syllables could have meant.

***

“You sure you don’t want me to watch Bartholomew so you lovebirds can go out?” Kes calls from the living room.

Poe sighs, and studies his face in the mirror. There isn’t anything he can do about the circles under his eyes (and fuck, the knowledge that, if Jess were still alive, she’d lend him some of that concealer shit because their skin tones were so well matched, really fucking hurts) and he’s wearing his nicest shirt that doesn’t have a stain on it, and he’s wearing shoes in the house (if only to hide that his socks don’t match because they never do anymore).

He smooths his hair down with his hand and gives his best smile. “This is as good as it’s going to get,” Poe warns himself.

Then, he yells back at his dad, “No, I want to be here when Bee goes to bed.”

“More like you want to be here in case you get to go to bed.”

“Dad!” Poe scolds as he walks out of the bathroom. “Gross!”

Kes rolls his eyes, hands Bee over, and then walks over to the door to shift around in a shopping bag near the shoe bin.

“Here,” Kes says, grinning evilly, standing back up, clutching something. “Just in case you decide it isn’t gross.” He walks back to Poe in the living room and slaps a box onto Poe’s chest. Poe shifts his son around in his arms so he can grab the box and look at it.

It’s a box of 24 condoms.

“Twenty-four?” He splutters. “What? Why? How --” Poe blushes, furiously. “How did you know I didn’t have any condoms?”

“I looked in your medicine cabinet, _mijo,_ ” Kes explains, waving his hand casually. “And I figured, you already got your hands full with the one kid. To be fair, you didn’t make him the fun way, but maybe just stick with one baby until you and your lady decide you want another?”

“Dad – I—we haven’t even kissed yet,” Poe whines, feeling distinctively fourteen years old again; fourteen was when his dad had sat him down the first time for The Birds and The Bees. _This_ time, though, there’s a different kind of Bee, and it’s a squirming toddler who belongs to Poe, who Poe is responsible for, so how exactly does he feel like a teenager again?

“Mhm,” Kes looks unconcerned as he goes to slide his loafers on. “Alright, Poe. You three have fun tonight, say hi to Rey for me.”

“Thanks, dad,” Poe mumbles, and Kes blows the two of them a kiss before he bounces out the door.

The perky bastard.

***

At precisely 5:59, the doorbell rings.

“Showtime,” Poe announces to Bee, grandly, scooping him up. Bee’s wearing his best onesie, and Poe’s looking not necessarily half-dead, and this is going to be a good night. There’s a quiet movie queued up to play (PG-13 and _everything_ ), Poe has all the ingredients for dinner lined up on the counter (okay, so he bought enough ingredients for three different recipes, and he hopes to figure out what Rey actually likes to eat when she’s not, you know, desperate to just eat), and there’s candles ready to be lit in his bedroom (so fucking sue him, he’s a romantic), and the box of condoms is very discreetly stashed in his medicine cabinet with only three or four shoved in his bedside table’s drawer (he’s going to look like a real fucking adult if they get to that point, not that he expects it to get to that point, because he doesn’t expect anything from Rey, even if she smiles at him tonight, it’ll be a good night).

Completely ready for once, Poe throws the door open, and smiles at Rey.

She’s wearing torn jeans and a loose sweatshirt, and her hair is half up in a high bun. There’s a small streak of grease on her nose, and there’s a bandage on her hand, the area around it looking red and painful, and her beat-up Converse are back on her feet.

And yeah, he was right the first time. Rey Smith’s the prettiest person he’s ever met.

“There he is,” she coos, smiling almost determinedly at Bee. Rey walks in the door when Poe steps to the side, and she holds her hands out, expectantly. Poe hands Bee over, and Rey immediately starts talking to Bee, rapid-fire, her back already to Poe. “So, soldier, what are we doing tonight? Maybe some sorting? You can show me your books?” Poe’s smiling at how comfortable the two of them look together, and he’s almost rudely startled out of his warm thoughts when Rey turns to him and addresses him briskly, professionally. “So, I already ate, and I imagine he has, too. What time will you be back, d’you think?”

“What?” Poe has no fucking clue what she’s talking about.

“You know, what time will you be home tonight?” Rey adjusts a squirming Bartholomew on her small hip. She gives Poe a weird look, and Poe has a feeling he’s giving her one as well. “Do you want me to give him a bath or anything before I put him down?”

“Why would you –” Poe clears his throat, awkwardly, and feels his face burn. “Did you…want me to leave?”

“You’re having your date here?” Rey asks, just as red in the face as Poe feels.

“My—” Poe splutters, an increasingly common occurrence for him. “Rey, do you think I have another date tonight?”

“Good-looking guy like you? I bet you go on lots of dates!” Rey says cheerfully. Forcibly cheerful, Poe notices. Her jaw is set like she’s about to fight someone.

“Not really,” Poe admits, feeling wrong-footed still. “But, Rey…I thought this was a date?”

Rey turns pale so quickly, he’s worried she  might faint. He walks forward in case he needs to catch her and/or Bee. “This is a date?” She squeaks self-consciously. “Oh, fuck, I thought you needed me to babysit.”

“What?” Poe squawks. “Why? How is it not obvious that I like you?” _Smooth, Dameron. Smooth._

“Because you fell asleep last time I was here, and you didn’t say anything about it. And your texts were very misleading!” Rey protests. Then, her face lights up with an evil grin. “Hang on a second – you like me?”

Poe groans and stomps his feet around slightly. “What a detail to catch onto,” he grumbles, blushing with less ferocity now. Rey waggles her eyebrows at him, clearly waiting for an answer, and he can’t deny her anything, he finds. Great. “Yes,” he sighs. “I like you. A lot. You’re very smart and very pretty and my brain doesn’t work well a lot of the time these days, so I’m sorry that my texts weren’t clear, but yes, I like you.” _Stop talking now,_ the rational part of his brain hisses.

“You likeeeee me!” Rey giggles, and then looks down at Bee. “Bartholomew, your father likes me! I think he’s propositioning me, loading me up with compliments and telling me all these nice things. He probably thinks it will get him somewhere, he thinks it will work on me.”

“Well, did it work?” Poe asks, feeling slightly more daring now that the awkward semi-soul baring part is over (he’ll hold back all of the intense, way too emotional thoughts he’s had in the last 72 hours because God, he isn’t that weird).

“I think it did,” Rey smiles back, cheekily. “Yes, I think it’s working very well.” She bites her lip again, and then looks down at Bee. “Where are my manners though? Flirting while holding a baby. Let’s go look at those books, hmm?”

Rey wanders off to Bee’s bedroom, and Poe spends about twenty-five seconds regretting not taking his father up on the offer to babysit.

***

Bee falls asleep around 7:50, and they tiptoe out of his room.

“How you feeling, Dameron?” Rey asks, sweetly, after they sit back down on the couch. “Groggy? Tired? Sleepy?”

“Mmm,” Poe mumbles, eyes drooping shut. “Whats’it?”

“Fine,” Rey sighs. “I guess we don’t have to have sex.”

Poe snores, lightly, and then Rey giggles and shoves him hard. Poe’s eyes fly open, and he roars with laughter, catching her by the arms and pulling her down on top of him, wrestling for control. Rey’s strong, almost as strong as he is – he has a feeling that if they went toe-to-toe officially he’d lose, and that honestly thrills him – but she officially wins when she tickles him, lightly, right over the ribs where he's always been ticklish.

“Cheater,” he howls, and then quiets, remembering that his son’s asleep. “Cheater,” he whispers, viciously.

“Mhm,” Rey acknowledges, not looking even the slightest bit guilty. Poe gulps in a way that he hasn’t since he was a teenager when he notices that now he’s lying flat on his back, Rey’s straddling his hips, and her hands are pinning his wrists to the couch. “I’m not above cheating when I know I want something.”

“And what do you want, Sunshine?” Poe asks, breathlessly.

“You,” she says simply. “I want to kiss you. Is that okay?”

“More than,” Poe says quickly, embarrassingly quickly. “Yes, definitely, yes.” Rey releases his wrists, and he immediately surges up to cup the back of her head with one hand, the other sliding around her shoulders to pull her down so their mouths can crash together.

Kissing Rey is like chasing the sunrise across the planet; it’s like the feeling of sitting behind a brand new plane and knowing that he’s about to make history. Kissing Rey makes him feel ten years younger.

She tastes like spaghetti, and chocolate, and something that’s just so hauntingly new and familiar at the same time that Poe thinks he might cry.

Her tongue runs along his bottom lip experimentally, and Poe groans, his hips thrusting upwards involuntarily while he opens his mouth to her exploration. It doesn’t feel like a fight for control at all. This is a dance, a partnership, an exhilarating discovery that’d knock him flat on his ass if he weren’t already lying down.

“I wanna be on top,” Poe confesses after a few minutes. “Can we flip?” His back’s a little sore, honestly, and he thinks the knot in his muscle will feel a little better with less pressure on it.

Rey nods, eagerly, nipping at his bottom lip, and that action has him wrapping an arm around her waist and reversing their positions so fast, he’s dizzy from it. He attacks her mouth with renewed vigor, and they find a pleasant, thrilling pattern quickly. “Rey,” he groans, abandoning her lips to kiss down her jaw. “You’re so fucking beautiful.”

Rey makes a low noise in her throat, and that makes him want to kiss her neck, so he does. He takes his time, and Rey tugs on his hair impatiently, but he shakes his head and takes his sweet time.

Then, she starts to snore. Loudly. Obnoxiously.

“Asshole,” Poe laughs, pulling back to look her in the face.

“You betcha,” she says cheerfully.

“Dada!” A familiar voice calls from the room down the hall. Poe groans and buries his face in Rey’s shoulder.

“I’ll get it,” she laughs, tapping him on the shoulder so he can let her up.

“You sure?” He asks, worried that she’s being nice.

The smile she fixes him with after she stands up and straightens out her clothes is nothing short of blinding. “More sure than I’ve ever been,” Rey says softly, and he knows, he really knows, that she isn’t just talking about right this second.

Good to know they’re on the same page.

And if he falls asleep listening to her sing a lullaby to Bartholomew, hey. He’s only human.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One day (Very soon) Dad!Poe won't be this tired, and then you'll get a sequel that's rated E ;)
> 
>  
> 
> PS You can come yell at me/request things on Tumblr, now 
> 
> https://dracosollicitus.tumblr.com/


End file.
